Written by Nick Abadzis | Art by Leandro Casco, J.B. Bastos | Published by Titan Comics

So, four issues in and time for The Eleventh Doctor to step up to the plate. Not that we haven’t seen him up to now of course, but if you’ve been paying attention we are cycling through the Doctor’s in numerical order. First issue aside, which was a multi-Doctor jam, we have followed The Ninth Doctor, then The Tenth, and now The Eleventh Doctor. Any guesses as to who takes centre stage next issue…

So something is very wrong with the universe, and the different Doctor’s are all discovering this, at different times in their respective timelines. White holes are destroying entire planets, and no-one knows why. Also the ‘Peace’ corruption force, which essentially turns the infected into zombies, is running rampant and closing in on the respective Doctor’s and companions. All The Doctor’s are literally racing against space and time to find a solution before everything is gone….which would leave a bit of a hole in my reviewing schedule.

So where did we leave The Eleventh Doctor and companion Alice? Nowhere, literally. They had effectively ended up in a void of nothing as space had simply run out. Even ‘nothing’ has a degree of substance though, and The Doctor find a minute quantum aperture that he manages to squeeze the TARDIS through, though the TARDIS is none too happy. It has good reason to be unhappy too, as down the universal rabbit hole they go, and end up in Gallifrey. This of course should be impossible, as Gallifrey is timelocked and time travel to it is impossible. Well, it was. To make matters worse, this is ancient Gallifrey, and without mercury to repair TARDIS circuits they are trapped. What’s a Doctor to do?

The Doctor had to do exactly the opposite of his natural instinct, and go low key. He could not, in any way, interact or interfere with this early Time Lord society or everything could unravel. His urge to see the Time Lord legendary figures Omega, and Rassilon, had to remain that, an urge. Patience , however, is not a Time Lord virtue and The Doctor ends up going to the Time Travel Capsule Growth Foundry to try and find components. TARDIS’s apparently are grown, not built. Bet you didn’t know that. Laying low doesn’t last long, and The Doctor is brought into the presence of the leader, Lord Rassilon. So The Doctor’s idea of being low-key ends up with him meeting a legendary Time Lord leader who presses him into service as a time travel test pilot. Oops.

Despite Alice’s reservations, The Doctor helps Rassilon, intending to get out at the first opportunity. Unfortunately, he’s first up to test pilot a brand new Type 1 TARDIS. Not good. In fact, so not good, Alice receives a hypercube visit from The Second Doctor, currently physically trapped in the void. He tells Alice his future self must not pilot that TARDIS, at any cost. Alice rushes to stop the launch, but is too late. The launch goes very badly, and The Doctor and TARDIS are both sucked into the time vortex, with no way to get them back. Not good.

Mixed feelings on this issue if I’m being honest. Firstly, this felt like an issue that not only could have been a normal issue of The Eleventh Doctor’s series, but even more so felt like a gateway story to get readers interested. The connection to the crossover stuff seemed minimal at best. On the plus side, Nick Abadzis wrote a technically strong story, with an inspired trip back to early Gallifreyan society that I really enjoyed. It was well told for sure. The art grew on me as I read the story. I initially thought it too cartoony, but it suited the story well and apart from sometimes too many panels being crammed on the page, it was a good read.

A good enough issue, but didn’t feel like Part 4 of a special event. Let’s hope the next issue does, as so far this has been a good read.